MY FAMILY

I am often asked, "How's the family?" Everyone is doing well despite Glyn's RECENT PASSING. Michaela is babysitting and recently bought a HORSE. Malachi is working for several different people this summer and mowing yards. And the YOUNGER GIRLS are seemingly trying to read through every book in the library (they are learning how to cook and sew as well). We would love for you come visit us. If it is in the Summer time, we'll spend some time on the CURRENT RIVER.

Children and the elderly are at a much greater risk of experiencing such adverse reactions. Such reactions may manifest during, as well as long after fluoroquinolone therapy had been discontinued.

The quote above was taken from a popular online encyclopedia. I've done several blog posts on FLUOROQUINOLONE ANTIBIOTICS, and while antibiotics in general are one of the worst things you can put in your body (HERE), for many people, fluoroquinolone exposure (leviquin, cipro, etc) has opened the door to a nightmare --- a veritable Pandora's Box of crippling side effects. Furthermore, remember that drug side effects are not usually reported much more than 3-5% of the time, meaning that doctors are telling you not to worry about it, when you should be running away at top speed. I had a patient put a handwritten letter in my hands yesterday and ask me to spread the word to as many people as possible.

Attention! Fibromyalgia and Levaquin do not mix! I just hope that this helps some people avoid what I've gone through from taking Levaquin. A couple of months ago, my doctor prescribed me Levaquin for my allergies. I never even looked at the possible side effects; they were just Antibiotics. Just two days later my body hurt in every muscle from head to toe. I was told I had to stay on them 10 days so I tried (I made it to day 8). Then I read the side effects information and was shocked to learn that Levaquin attacks ligaments and tendons. I learned that they could pop [rupture] and cause problems for months or even years.

About day 7 I felt a tendon SNAP in my right shoulder. I could not even raise my arm the pain was so awful. I then went to my regular doctor who put a steroid injection in my shoulderand gave me steroid pills.

Doctors should not prescribe this antibiotic to patients with Fibromyalgia. My doctor said that my severe reaction was not typical. After studying the matter, I tend to disagree. Anyway, here I am two months later with an aching shoulder. And this could last for months, or even years. I had no idea there were this many side effects listed, and would never have taken this drug if I had read the info paper first. I am in pain every waking moment. These pills attacked my whole body.

Deb G. 5/29/2013

Oh, I forgot to include this portion of the quote in the top section. "Tendon damage may manifest months after therapy had been completed and in severe cases may result in lifelong disabilities. Older patients may have an increased risk of tendinopathy (including rupture), especially with concomitant corticosteroid use.... Current or past treatment with oral corticosteroids is associated with an increased risk of Achilles tendon rupture, especially in elderly patients also taking the fluoroquinolones.... Within this group concomitant use of corticosteroids increases this risk substantially."

I have warned repeatedly that CORTICOSTEROID INJECTIONS never provide lasting relief or benefit, but often result in some serious (degenerative) side effects, as well as warning people against using antibiotics for either ALLERGIES or SINUS INFECTIONS. I've also been warning of the same phenomenon (connective tissue destruction) happening with statin drugs (HERE). And for some of you, from (gulp) VACCINES (see previous link).

If you are one of the tens of millions of Americans struggling with chronic health issues (FIBROMYALGIA included), be sure to take a look at THIS AMAZING SELF-HELP POST. And don't forget to show us some love on FACEBOOK as it's one of the best and easiest ways to reach those you love and care about most.

ANOTHER 25+ YEAR CASE OF PIRIFORMIS SYNDROME SOLVED!

After seeing Gale constantly struggling with chronic buttock pain and sciatica, I suggested to her that she probably had PIRIFORMIS SYNDROME, and should try our TISSUE REMODELING TREATMENT to see if that would resolve it. She finally gave in. After struggling for decades, she is no longer in pain. Watch her short Video Testimonial.

CHRONIC NECK PAIN AND HEADACHES(AND DeQUERVAIN'S SYNDROME)

Before going through a couple of Scar Tissue Remodeling treatments a number of years ago, Heather had suffered from long-term neck pain and headaches. Although her pain was relieved by Chiropractic Adjustments, the relief was always short-lived (a few days at best). This is extremely common in people with Scar Tissue / FASCIAL ADHESIONS. She was also starting to develop DeQUERVAIN'S SYNDROME, which was fixed immediately today. Thanks for the video Heather.

THORACOLUMBAR SPINE VIDEO TESTIMONIAL

Image by Anatomography

The image on the left shows the diamond-shaped Thoracolumbar Fascia (arrow), with another image of a lumbar spine overlayed in red. I show you this because Mary has been coming to me for a long time with low back pain that was diagnosed via MRI as being caused by her Spinal Discs (disc-related pain).

The problem is that according to the latest scientific research, 50-70% of the adult American population is walking around with disc problems in their low backs that they are completely unaware of because they do not hurt (HERE). Think about this for a moment. The majority of us would show a HERNIATED DISC on MRI if we had one --- even if we have no pain. Not knowing this information sets people up for failure when it comes to SPINAL SURGERIES. It also means that it is always easy for a doctor to find some kind of abnormality on the MRI to blame your pain on.

As you can see from the picture below, Mary is fun to be around. She is sweet, gentle, and loves to laugh. For five years though, she has not felt like laughing due to severe chronic pain. That is until a couple of months ago when I was able to convince her that she needed to try our TISSUEREMODELING TREATMENT. She had brutal FASCIAL ADHESIONS of her THORACOLUMBAR FASCIA. Make absolutely sure you click on this link. It contains two 10 second videos of Thoracolumbar Fascia (one of a person with low back pain and one of a person with no low back pain). I'll stop and let Mary tell you the rest of her story. Thanks for the video Mary. We love you!

YOUR HEALTH IS UP TO....... YOU!

GYM EQUIPMENT CAN QUICKLY DATE ITSELF: THE TITANIC'S FITNESS ROOM

I find it interesting how people think. You would be surprised at the number of people I see who believe that since the Affordable Care Act was passed, they can finally be healthy. False! Your health is and always has been completely up to you. I get it; some people were unfortunate enough to be born with genetic diseases, physical defects, or other severe inborn health problems. In the big scheme of things, these are RARE. I am speaking to the rest of you. It is time you take what God gifted you with and take care of it! Don't tell yourself that you will start next week. Start today.

Remember my EXCUSESpost from last week? I want to give you some things that you can do on your own to take care of your body, and spend as little time as possible doing it. As far as working out / exercising is concerned, HERE is my short post on the best way to lose weight and keep it off forever. As you already know, I am a huge believer in STRENGTH TRAINING. Sure, I think think that Cardio Training is great, but if you simply look at the research, you'll see that a little of it goes a long way. This is to your advantage! You do not have to be a gym member, nor do you have to spend 1-2 hours a day doing workouts like P-90X (or running mile after mile after mile) to achieve incredible results. If you'll cut the JUNK and SODAS, and eat a diet based on WHOLE FOODS (specifically think PALEO HERE), you can spend a brief time working out (emphasis on brief) --- in the privacy of your own home if you like --- and achieve incredible results quickly (HERE).

How good of a workout can you get without being a member of a gym? Believe it or not, you can possibly do better than you could in many gyms. And all you need are an EXERCISE BALL and some light hand weights (dumbells), and if you are really motivated --- a HOMEMADE KETTLEBELL. The Exercise Ball (they go by lots of names including balance ball, fit ball, fitness ball, gym ball, physio ball, Pilates ball, sports ball, stability ball, Swedish ball, Swiss ball, therapy ball, etc, etc, etc) is simply a large inflatable ball that can be purchased at Cramazon or Mal-Wart (make sure to spend a few more bucks and get the 'burst resistant' heavy duty ball).

The real advantage to incorporating the Exercise Ball into your strength training is that the instability of the ball builds strength and stability into all parts of your body ---- particularly your CORE. Instead of working out on a stable surface (a bench or floor), the ball forces the body to engage many more muscles just to maintain balance (which is great PROPRIOCEPTIVE TRAINING). Not only is this great for your body, it is great for your brain as well (HERE). There is arguably no better (or easier) core strengthening program than to spend time on the ball. Simply head on over to YouTube and check out their videos on how to do strength and proprio training on a ball.

SIMPLE (QUICK) BALL WORKOUTS YOUCAN DO IN YOUR OWN LIVING ROOM

The ball workouts below are not necessarily the best, nor are they the only thing out there. My hope is for you to watch these, take from them what you like, get started, and then continue to add exercises from there. I promise that if you get with it and don't slog, you can do a total body workout in 10-15 minutes. Make sure that you mix it up and are not doing the same workout every single time. If you are watching what you eat, and doing a ball / resistance workout several times a week, you will see changes. In fact, INCREDIBLE HEALTH AND BODY CHANGES are quite possible in a brief period of time. And if you really want to do something cool, invest in a WBV MACHINE as they are quite versatile.

UNCONTROLLED BLOOD SUGAR

AMERICA'S NUMBER ONE DESTROYER OF HEALTH

A year and a half ago, I wrote a two part article called THE NUMBER ONE HEALTH PROBLEM IN AMERICA. It is our number one blog post of all time, and concerns Uncontrolled Blood Sugar. The thing that is important to remember here is that lots and lots of people who fall into the proper spot on their blood sugar testing, could easily be categorized as having Uncontrolled Blood Sugar. The fact that almost one half of people with Type II diabetes already have detectable neuropathy by the time they have been diagnosed with diabetes(HERE), should be a wake up call that we are doing something darn drastically wrong as far as detection and treatment of Uncontrolled Blood Sugar is concerned. In other words folks, this is not simply a "DIABETES" issue.

And it doesn't stop with Neuropathy and female problems like PCOS. Virtually every single health problem you can think of is being tied back in the scientific peer-reviewed literature to Uncontrolled Blood Sugar. And don't forget that HYPOGLYCEMIA (low blood sugar) falls into this same category as well, and is the flip side of the coin that we call Diabetes.

If you are serious about both your HEALTH AND YOUR WEIGHT, and your potential ability to live a long and productive life, click on the link at the top of the page. It is a five minute read that could change your life.

ADHESED FASCIA IS A LIVING BREATHING NIGHTMARE

Mystic Art Design - Pixabay

Nightmares. We've all had them. No one likes them, but what are you going to do? When it comes to things that can go wrong with the body, ADHESED FASCIA can present itself as a nightmare for the simple reason that the most abundant connective tissue in the body also happens to be the most pain-sensitive as well (HERE --- some of which is due to the fact that it acts as its own nervous system --- HERE). Add to it the fact that for the most part it can't be imaged with standard tests such as MRI (HERE), and things can get really crazy really quickly. Fortunately, thanks to rapid technological advancements in advanced imaging, there is a test that allows visualization of fascia --- Diagnostic Ultrasound.

In the picture below, you'll notice the diamond-shaped area in the LOW BACK which is called the THORACOLUMBAR FASCIA. This fascia is impregnated and concurrent with at least three different muscle tendons, giving it three distinct layers that must glide independently of each other. Although I did a post on this topic several months ago (HERE), I recently added two short (7 second) videos that show how adhesions in the fascia restrict normal joint motion. For the record, one of the authors of the study the videos came from is DR. HELENE LANGEVIN; one of a growing number of elite physicians touting fascial adhesions as not only the root of huge amounts of pain, but of much --- maybe even most --- of chronic illness (HERE).

It is amazing to actually see, with my own eyes, the model of pain and dysfunction that I've been promoting for two decades actually coming to life like FRANKENSTEIN'S MONSTER. If nothing else, take a few seconds to watch the videos. Play them at the same time so you can see the difference side-by-side. Like I said, amazing! If you find this interesting, be sure and take a look at my "Fascia Super Post" containing ALL 165 PLUS articles I've written on fascia and Scar Tissue. Oh; and don't forget to like, share, or follow on FACEBOOK as it's a great way to reach the people you love and care about most.

EXCERPTS FROMDEATH BY MEDICINE

elsebjgmailcom - Dansk - Pixabay

Although this study is nearly a decade and a half old, it will still send shivers down your spine (not to mention the fact that it's being proven time and time again by peer-review --- HERE). For instance, not that long ago, BMJ reported that between 300,000 and 500,000 people die each year as the direct result of SLEEPING PILLS (BTW, this study was not counted in the totals). But I regress. Back in 2004, three medical doctors and two research experts (Ph.D's) crunched the data from hundreds of peer-reviewed medical studies and rolled it into one huge meta-analysis. The result was a massive indictment, logically and systematically laid out against the Medical Profession and PHARMACEUTICAL INDUSTRY in the form of a scientific paper. Here are some shocking excerpts from Dr. Gary Null's landmark study, Death by Medicine.......

Each year approximately 2.2 million US hospital patients experience adverse drug reactions (ADRs) to prescribed medications... Approximately 7.5 million unnecessary medical and surgical procedures are performed annually in the US, while approximately 8.9 million Americans are hospitalized unnecessarily.

Deaths induced inadvertently by a physician or surgeon or by medical treatment or diagnostic procedures [aka 'Iatrogenesis'] in the US annually is 783,936. By comparison, approximately 699,697 Americans died of heart disease in 2001, while 553,251 died of cancer.

US health care spending reached $1.6 trillion in 2003, representing 14% of the nation's gross national product. Considering this enormous expenditure, we should have the best medicine in the world. We should be preventing and reversing disease, and doing minimal harm. Careful and objective review, however, shows we are doing the opposite. Because of the extraordinarily narrow, technologically driven context in which contemporary medicine examines the human condition, we are completely missing the larger picture.

As few as 5% and no more than 20% of iatrogenic acts are ever reported. This implies that if medical errors were completely and accurately reported, we would have an annual iatrogenic death toll much higher than 783,936. In 1994, Leape [a Harvard University researcher] said his figure of 180,000 medical mistakes resulting in death annually was equivalent to three jumbo-jet crashes every two days. Our considerably higher figure is equivalent to six jumbo jets are falling out of the sky each day.

Our estimated 10-year total of 7.8 million iatrogenic deaths is more than all the casualties from all the wars fought by the US throughout its entire history.

A 2003 study found that nearly half of medical school faculty who serve on institutional review boards to advise on clinical trial research also serve as consultants to the pharmaceutical industry.

In June 2002, the New England Journal of Medicine announced that it would accept journalists who accept money from drug companies because it was too difficult to find ones who have no ties..... In l981 the drug industry “gave” $292 million to colleges and universities for research. By l991, this figure had risen to $2.1 billion.

Leape focused on the “Harvard Medical Practice Study” published in 1991........ Why Leape chose to use the much lower figure of 4% injury for his analysis remains in question. Using instead the average of the rates found in the three studies he cites (36%, 20%, and 4%) would have produced a 20% medical error rate. The number of iatrogenic deaths using an average rate of injury and his 14% fatality rate would be 1,189,576.

In 1995, a JAMA report noted, "Over a million patients are injured in US hospitals each year, and approximately 280,000 die annually as a result of these injuries.... An October 2003 JAMA study from the US government's Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ) documented 32,000 mostly surgery-related deaths costing $9 billion and accounting for 2.4 million extra hospital days in 2000.

An analysis by Wald and Shojania found that only 1.5% of all adverse events result in an incident report.

A 2002 study shows that 20% of hospital medications for patients had dosage errors. Nearly 40% of these errors were considered potentially harmful to the patient. In a typical 300-patient hospital, the number of errors per day was 40.

In a New England Journal of Medicine study, an alarming one in four patients suffered observable side effects from the more than 3.34 billion prescription drugs filled in 2002.

According to William Agger, MD, director of microbiology and chief of infectious disease at Gundersen Lutheran Medical Center in La Crosse, WI, 30 million pounds of antibiotics are used in America each year. Of this amount, 25 million pounds are used in animal husbandry, and 23 million pounds are used to try to prevent disease and the stress of shipping, as well as to promote growth. Only 2 million pounds are given for specific animal infections.... In the US, over 3 million pounds of antibiotics are used every year on humans. With a population of 284 million Americans, this amount is enough to give every man, woman, and child 10 teaspoons of pure antibiotics per year.

In 1989, German biostatistician Ulrich Abel, PhD, wrote a monograph entitled “Chemotherapy of Advanced Epithelial Cancer.” Abel presented a comprehensive analysis of clinical trials and publications representing over 3,000 articles examining the value of chemotherapy on advanced epithelial cancer. Epithelial cancer is the type of cancer with which we are most familiar, arising from epithelium found in the lining of body organs such as the breast, prostate, lung, stomach, and bowel. From these sites, cancer usually infiltrates adjacent tissue and spreads to the bone, liver, lung, or brain. With his exhaustive review, Abel concluded.... “Many oncologists take it for granted that response to therapy prolongs survival, an opinion which is based on a fallacy and which is not supported by clinical studies.”

In 1974, 2.4 million unnecessary surgeries were performed, resulting in 11,900 deaths at a cost of $3.9 billion. In 2001, 7.5 million unnecessary surgical procedures were performed, resulting in 37,136 deaths at a cost of $122 billion (using 1974 dollars).

In 1978, the US Office of Technology Assessment (OTA) reported: “Only 10-20% of all procedures currently used in medical practice have been shown to be efficacious by controlled trial." In 1995, the OTA compared medical technology in eight countries (Australia, Canada, France, Germany, the Netherlands, Sweden, the UK, and the US ) and again noted that few medical procedures in the US have been subjected to clinical trial. It also reported that US infant mortality was high and life expectancy low compared to other developed countries.

In 1983, 809,000 cesarean sections (21% of live births) were performed in the US, making it the nation's most common obstetric-gynecologic (OB/GYN) surgical procedure. In 2001, cesarean section is still the most common OB/GYN surgical procedure. Approximately 4 million births occur annually, with 24% (960,000) delivered by cesarean section. In the Netherlands, only 8% of births are delivered by cesarean section.

HAVE THINGS CHANGED?

So, the real question here is did Null's study accomplish anything valuable, or is it still business as usual for BIG PHARMA and Corporate Medicine (today that would be virtually all of Medicine)? Thanks to the internet, there is a lot more discussion on these topics and fewer places for the guilty to hide. However, I am not convinced that despite a lot of rules that typically represent massive amounts of government overkill (can anyone say HIPAA?), not much has changed in the last decade or so. If you follow my blog, you already know this. It's just about what you would expect when it comes to "EVIDENCE-BASED MEDICINE".

OBESITY, DEPRESSION, LOSS OF LIBIDO, AND THEIR RELATIONSHIP TO POOR GUT HEALTH

aliceabc0 (Português) from Pixabay

I love it! My wife comes home from the gym with a testosterone buzz and attacks me.A patient explaining one of the benefits of his wife's new-found love of Strength Training.

When I woke up mom and dad were rolling on the couch. Rolling numbers, rock and rolling, got my Kiss records out.Cheap Trick from 1978's Surrender.

The word "libido" not only entails one's sex drive or desire to engage in sexual activity, but includes things like sexual thoughts and sexual responsiveness as well. Here in America,LOSS OF LIBIDO (formally referred to as HSDD or Hypo-Sexual Desire Disorder) is said to affect approximately 1 in 5 males. But according to 2006's giant PRESIDE study, almost 45% of America's females have a sexual dysfunction, with 'lack of interest' coming out on top at almost 40% ---- nearly double what was seen in the NHSLS Survey of 1999. Did you catch that? Contrary to what you may have learned, lack of desire is not considered normal. It is considered to be a "dysfunction".

When you look at lists of the things that most commonly affect one's sex drive in an adverse manner (whether male or female), there are two that seem to come up over and over and over again; Depression and Obesity. If you follow my blog, you'll see that I have written about both topics extensively. My goal is to help those of you dealing with this unhappy triad of OBESITY (be aware that it's possible to fall into this category even if you are 'SKINNY'), DEPRESSION, and Low Libido, get your lives back without feeling the need to resort to dangerous and addictive drugs.

HEALTH BENEFITS OF SEX

If you want a good marriage, you need to be having sex. Period --- end of story. Buying into the myth that, "as long as both parties agree, even once a year is fine," is missing the point on many different levels. Not only is sex going to deeply connect you to your spouse, the peer-reviewed scientific literature is absolutely chocked full of its known benefits including things like.....

Unfortunately, not only are increasing numbers of couples not having much sex, many are actually in marriages that are, by definition, "sexless" (less than once a month or less than 10 times per year). This begs the question as to how much sex is "normal"? Although every couple is different, over the past twelve years, the average for married couples here in America has dropped from 132 times per year to 103 times per year (-22%). After a little study on the matter, it's not difficult to figure out why.

IF SEX IS SO GOOD FOR PEOPLE, WHY IS THE FREQUENCY DROPPING SO DRAMATICALLY?

There a whole host of reasons that either men or women would not desire sex --- many of which are emotional. However, it is no coincidence that during the same twelve years mentioned above, the incidence of DIABETES, CARDIOMETABOLIC SYNDROME, Obesity, Depression, FIBROMYALGIA, ENDOCRINE PROBLEMS, and all sorts of "LEAKIES" have all skyrocketed --- all of which are associated in the peer-reviewed scientific / medical literature with DIMINISHED LIBIDO. As far as men are concerned, the number one reason (other than serious illness) that they would not desire sex would be Low Testosterone. And guess what? Both Blood Sugar Dysregulation and Depression are intimately associated with "LOW TESTOSTERONE", which is itself intimately tied to Obesity --- particularly CENTRAL OBESITY. Although Central Obesity is increasingly an issue with women, women are naturally more complicated than men to get to the root of the problem.

Obesity is associated with depression.... Persons with severe obesity may represent an “at-risk” population...... This association between severe obesity and depression is also of interest to clinicians, since depression is associated with poorer treatment outcomes. Is Obesity Associated with Major Depression? Results from the Third National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey, Johns Hopkins University, from the 2003 issue of The American Journal of Epidimiology

Overall, poor health has a negative impact on sexual function. Illnesses that interfere with endocrine systemsare particularly important in the impairment of female sexual desire. Several lines of evidence have revealed a link between sexual desire and levels of androgens[Too little or too much testosterone ---PCOS]in women. Consequently, disorders of ovarian function and of the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal axis have been associated with decreased sexual desire and arousal..... Some drugs (especially selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors and antipsychotics) have also been linked to orgasm disorders...... Untreated depression, anxiety, and other mood disorders have been linked to problems with sexual desire and arousal.Excerpted from From Hence Comes HSDD? Sharon J. Parish, MD, from the July 2009 issue of the Journal of Family Practice.

The numbers speak for themselves. 12% of American women and nearly 7% percent of American men aged 18 and older (over 12 million and 6 million respectively) deal with Clinical Depression --- numbers that skyrocket far beyond this if you figure in sub-clinical Depression as well as those who have never been 'officially' diagnosed. If you factor in the fact that Depression is characterized as a disturbance in one's mood, which is characterized by feelings of sadness, anger, low self-esteem, general loss, and loss of interest in pleasurable activities, you begin to see where this is headed. Take it a step further and notice that the scientific-medical literature on the subject also strongly associates Depression with a PATHOLOGICAL CRAVING for processed carbohydrates. Once you understand that the vast majority (90 - 95%) of the body's serotonin (a 'feel-good' neurotransmitter) is manufactured in the Gut (HERE), the link between Depression and loss of libido starts to become more clear.

A 1995 study done at Massachusetts Institute of Technology called Brain Serotonin, Carbohydrate-Craving, Obesity and Depression, and published in the medical journal Obesity Research, had this to say on the subject, "Serotonin-releasing brain neurons are unique in that the amount of neurotransmitter they release is normally controlled by food intake: Carbohydrate consumption. Serotonin release is also involved in such functions as sleep onset, pain sensitivity, blood pressure regulation, and control of the mood. Hence many patients learn to overeat carbohydrates (particularly snack foods, like potato chips or pastries, which are rich in carbohydrates and fats) to make themselves feel better. This tendency to use certain foods as though they were drugs is a frequent cause of weight gain, and can also be seen in patients who become fat when exposed to stress, or in women with premenstrual syndrome........"

I would think that we would all agree that Depression needs to be treated. The problem though is that treating Depression with anti-depressant medications can be a double-edged sword that often produces a vicious (and sexless) cycle. This is because not only is Depression a libido destroyer in and of itself, but so are the medications used to treat it.

Depression is bad news for the libido because while it is sapping one's sex drive, the antidepressants prescribed to treat it are doing the same thing. The conclusion of a large meta-analysis of studies on this topic was published in Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) Psychiatry in 2010. The study called, Overweight, Obesity, and Depression: A Systematic Review and Meta-analysis of Longitudinal Studies, said that, "This meta-analysis confirms a reciprocal link between depression and obesity. Obesity was found to increase the risk of depression, most pronounced among Americans and for clinically diagnosed depression. In addition, depression was found to be predictive of developing obesity." And the kicker is that despite most drug's warning labels saying that somewhere between 2 and 16% of those on antidepressants (SSRI's) will develop sexual side effects, many experts say that 40% of those on anti-depressants develop diminished libido. Both groups might be significantly underestimating the problem.

The Journal of Clinical Psychiatry published a study clear back in 2001 that looked at the medical records of 1,000 individuals who were being treated for Depression at the University Hospital of Salamanca (Spain). A whopping 57% of the women reported sexual side effects of their treatment --- mostly SSRI's. The most common were loss of libido and orgasm dysfunctions such as inability to orgasm or painful orgasm. And while the women's side effects were considered to be more severe, men were affected at a rate that was actually 5% higher than the women. The results were similar in a South Korean study that was published in a 2010 issue of the medical journal Psychiatry Investigations. After looking again at the effects of SSRI's on sexual health, the authors concluded that, "The incidence of sexual dysfunction was substantially high during antidepressant treatment..... Our study suggests the need for clinicians to consider the impact of pharmacotherapy on patients' sexual functioning in the course of treatment with antidepressants."

Could dealing with one's obesity have positive effects in the bedroom? In 2009 one of the true experts in the field, Dr. Mitu Shah, an OB / GYN professor at the University of Missouri Saint Louis Medical School, weighed in on the matter in the conclusion of a study published in a 2009 edition of Obstetrics and Gynecology Clinics of North America. This expert in the field of Menopause and Female Sexual Disorders stated that, "The treatment of obesity will have a positive effect on a woman's sexual health, with a likely improvement in FSD (Female Sexual Dysfunction) and a decrease in risk factors related to contraception, pregnancy, infertility, and menopause". Did you catch that? Not only is dealing with one's weight going to help boost libido, it is going to help a wide variety of female reproductive issues. This should not come as a surprise for those who read THIS POST a couple of weeks ago.

The bottom line is that I could quote the scientific research all day long, as there are literally hundreds --- probably thousands of studies on the topic. Instead of doing that, I want to leave you with a few things that you can do to boost your sex drive naturally. These are not gender-specific and unless otherwise noted, will work equally well for both men and women. They are in no particular order.

BOOSTING LIBIDO NATURALLY

aliceabc0 (Português) from Pixabay

KILL STRESS: I get it. Getting rid of stress is not as easy as simply wishing it away. But remember this. Prolonged stress leads to ADRENAL FATIGUE (the older name for Fibromyalgia). If you cannot get the stressors in your life under control (family, relationships, job, diet, etc), it will be difficult to deal with the underlying causes of diminished libido. By the way, there are lots of studies saying that sex itself is a great stress reliever. Think about this treatment cycle for a moment; more sex, less stress, increased libido, more sex, less stress, increased libido. I realize it's not that easy, but it is definitely a noble goal.

WORK ON THE RELATIONSHIP: I do not claim to be some sort of 'Relationship Sherpa'. However, my wife is --- she's a marriage counselor, and some of her wisdom has rubbed off on me (she might sometimes debate this). You'll need to communicate well, spend quality time with your spouse (can anyone say "Date Nite"?). Remember though that even though the emotional side of diminished libido gets a lot of play, you cannot neglect the physical side and hope to solve your problem(s).

CONTROL YOUR BLOOD SUGAR:Let me qualify this statement by saying that many people (both men and women) who are at or near a 'normal' weight, are, metabolically speaking, obese (HERE). Virtually everything that is related to health comes back to blood sugar, and whether or not it is being regulated properly --- even if you have not (yet) been told you have DIABETES. One of the single most important things that you can do for your sexual health and libido is to deal with UNCONTROLLED BLOOD SUGAR. Listen up men. Your POT BELLY is FEMINIZING YOU! You are not only causing Depression, lethargy, and diminished physical performance, you are essentially castrating / neutering yourself with high blood sugar, high insulin levels, and the subsequent weight gain which, sooner or later, is sure to follow. By the way, if you are a woman who is struggling with female issues in general, please take a few minutes to read my piece called BEATING INFERTILITY NATURALLY (it is not just about fertility). Oh, and what is the best way to control your blood sugar...............?

EAT A LOW CARB DIET: Have you picked up on the fact that the scientific literature is showing that both depressed and obese individuals lean heavily toward SUGAR / CARB ADDICTIONS? Despite this, there are MANY PEOPLE who promote high carbs to boost both Serotonin and mood. HERE is the information on using a Low Carb Diet to break the cycle and provide A SEROTONIN BOOST. As I stated earlier, over 90% of the "feel good" neurotransmitter Serotonin is found in the gut. Thus, it only makes sense to........

FIX YOUR GUT: I have already shown you that Gut Health is intimately tied to Depression. My blog also happens to be full of posts on the relationship between Gut Health and Obesity. But did you know that POOR GUT HEALTH is being tied as a root cause of nearly every health issue you can imagine (MAKE ABSOLUTELY SURE YOU READ THIS)? If you are one of the tens of millions of Americans who (almost always unknowingly), is dealing with LEAKY GUT SYNDROME, there is no way that you are going to have a healthy sex drive. One of the best ways to positively affect Gut Health is to....

GO GLUTEN FREE: Gluten Free is not a big leap if you are already eating Low Carb. In case you have not been reading my blog on a regular basis, let me just remind you that almost every health problem you can name is being linked back to Uncontrolled Blood Sugar and GLUTEN --- HERE is one example. Just a few short years ago (2010), a study published in The Journal of Reproductive Health showed how Gluten was directly involved with a plethora "Reproductive Symptoms" seen in prior studies on sexual health. The bottom line is that sick people usually see incredible improvement when they go GLUTEN FREE. Oh, and if you do not understand GLUTEN CROSS REACTIVITY, read the link.

EXERCISE: Do I even need to talk about this? There are about a jillion studies linking moderate exercise to lower incidence of Depression, Stress, and Obesity. There are probably just as many showing the link between exercise and improved sex drive (I Googled 'exercise sexual health' and got nearly 17 million hits). I am not going to belabor this point, but you should value yourself / your spouse enough to EXERCISE20-30 minutes, 3 or 4 times a week. If you arediscouraged about exercising, READ THIS.

BEWARE OF MEDICATIONS: Have you seen the list of meds that can ruin one's sex drive? It is downright freaky (HERE). There are a host of meds (including birth control pills, high blood pressure medications, ANTIBIOTICS that all destroy Gut Health, and STATINS) that diminish sex drive. It is critical to remember though, that the number one class of medication for fouling up libido is anti-depressants. Of these, SSRI's lead the way. Interestingly enough, another leading class of drugs known for messing up one's sex drive are meant to affect the Gut (anti-nausea and ANTI-ULCER DRUGS).

UNDERSTAND INFLAMMATION: Although everyone has heard the term "INFLAMMATION" used about a million times, few people really have any idea of what it is. And since Obesity, Depression, and Diabetes are all considered to be "Inflammatory Diseases", it would behoove you to understand a little bit more about Inflammation, what drives it, and how to squelch it.

UNDERSTAND YOUR THYROID:If you Google "Thyroid Low Libido", you get over three quarters of a million hits. I would suggest you take the time to visit the THYROID EPIDEMIC site for a better understanding of how this all works together. The really cool thing is that many thyroid problems can be effectively dealt with by following the bullet points on this list. Blood Sugar Dysregulation and Thyroid Problems are both problems of the Endocrine System. Do you recall the quote from earlier in the post from the Journal of Family Practice? "Illnesses that interfere with Endocrine Systems are particularly important in the impairment of female sexual desire."

TAKE THE RIGHT SUPPLEMENTS: What do I recommend? Firstly, I recommend WHOLE FOOD SUPPLEMENTS as just that ---- a "supplement" to a healthy diet. The problem is that most people want a Viagra-like supplement that allows them to keep on destroying themselves with their crappy diets and self-destructive lifestyles (INTERESTED IN FEMALE VIAGRA?). The best natural Testosterone booster is Tribulus Terrestris. A great general libido booster is Ginkgo Biloba (both by Medi-Herb). I am also sold on Symplex M and Symplex F by Standard Process (for men and women respectively). Again, it is far more about your diet (what you are eating or not eating) than it is about spending a lot of money on supplements. And while you are at it, READ THIS ARTICLE on why boosting Serotonin might not be the panacea it has been made out to be.

GIVE UP THE SMOKES AND DRINK ONLY IN MODERATION: One of the biggest problems with SMOKING is that it hinders blood flow. Without good blood flow, both men and women are going to struggle with satisfactory sex. Too much alcohol not only does the same thing, it is metabolized very similarly to sugar.

BALANCE YOUR HORMONES: The big driver of libido for both men and women is Testosterone. That's right ladies, the very substance that drives your husband's libido, also drives yours. However, more is not always better. Increased Testosterone in women is heavily associated with (diagnostic of) PCOS --- the most common female hormonal problem in America ---- a problem that actually decreases sex drive. Although I have a lot of information on balancing hormones, the best thing you can do for yourself (other than following these bullet points) is to make sure you are getting just a little bit of high quality protein every two hours. Also make sure to visit our post on XENOHORMONESas well. Understanding this concept is critical to those of you who are in a state of ESTROGEN DOMINANCE (possibly the majority of you, both women and men). Remember just a few points back when I accused overweight men of feminizing themselves? Estrogen causes weight gain, while fat cells (along with the female organs) manufacture Estrogen. Repeat. See the vicious cycle setting up?

This article is really no different than dozens of others I have written. There is no simple fix for diminished libido, but there is a simple formula. It is virtually the same formula you would use to begin solving almost any health problem you might be dealing with. This is because Low Libido, along with practically every other health problem you can think of, is nothing more than a symptom of a deeper and more serious health problem. The cool thing is that when you address your health by changing your diet and lifestyle, you will likewise address virtually everything that is ailing you. HERE is an example of what I am talking about.

ADHD IN CHILDREN LINKED TO OBESITY LATER IN LIFE

A new study from the medical journal Pediatrics has determined that men who were diagnosed with ADHD as children, were twice as likely to be OBESE in later life (my guess is that it has a great deal not to do with the diagnosis itself, but in the drugs these kids are given, and their GUT HEALTH). For more information on the best ways to deal with both problems, please follow the links. Just be aware that the authors declared support from Eli Lilly, Shire Pharmaceuticals, GLAXOSMITHKLINE, and Genopharm. This means that soon, these companies will be coming out with new drugs for said problems. Isn't "EVIDENCE-BASED MEDICINE" just grand?

If you know people with children who have been diagnosed with ADD / ADHD, please forward this post. You can also help us reach more people by liking us on FACEBOOK.

WHAT IS NEUROPATHYAND HOW IS IT RELATED TO BLOOD SUGAR AND GLUTEN?

Image by Milorad Dimic MD

Image by Stan Shebs

Because nerves are damaged by the "mildly" elevated blood sugar levels that most doctors ignore [see my first link below], almost one half of people with Type 2 diabetes already have detectable neuropathy by the time they have been diagnosed with diabetes. Many other people who are never officially diagnosed with diabetes but have higher than normal blood sugars also get "diabetic" neuropathy. It may be a major cause of the impotence so common among men in their 40s and older.Jenny Ruhl, from Blood Sugar 101

Today is the last day of "Neuropathy Awareness Week" so I thought I would write a short post on the topic. Because of our poor diets, Neuropathy is quite common here in America, affecting (according to the Neuropathy Association) at least 7.5% of the population --- 1 in 15 people or 20,000,000. The feet are the most commonly affected area, followed by the legs. Next comes the hands and arms. Notice the pattern? The further away from the heart, the more likely the area will be affected by Neuropathy if the causal conditions are present. Some of the most common Symptoms associated with Peripheral Neuropathy include:

Numbness, Tingling, or Burning --- particularly in the toes / feet, or reduced ability to feel changes in temperature, especially in your feet and toes

A reduced ability to feel pain --- OR a heightened ability to percieve pain (the lightest touch can be agonizing)

A popular online encyclopedia defines "Neuropathy" (aka "PERIPHREAL NEUROPATHY") thusly: "Damage to nerves of the peripheral nervous system, which may be caused either by diseases of or trauma to the nerve or the side effects of systemic illness." The thing that catches my eye here are the words "Systemic Illness". Would Diabetes be considered to be a Systemic Illness (a whole-body illness that affects multiple body systems)? You better believe it would! In fact, the number one factor in developing Neuropathy is whether or not you have UNCONTROLLED BLOOD SUGAR. Be warned; huge numbers of you have this problem even though you do not realize it. This is because you have not yet been diagnosed with DIABETES. The other thing heavily associated with Neuropathy is.......

Gluten (wheat / grain protein) is strongly associated with Neuropathy as well. When I Googled "Gluten Neuropathy" I got well over one million hits. I am not going to go into great detail about why GLUTEN is particularly NEUROTOXIC, but if you click links in the next paragraph, you will see that most of these are associated with Gluten Sensitivity.

HOW WOULD YOU BEST TREAT YOUR NEUROPATHY?

Seriously, this is not as difficult as you might think. If Uncontrolled Blood Sugar and Gluten are two of the most common factors in developing the problem, a starting point for everyone would be to go on a Low Carb (or better yet, PALEO) Diet. As far as something to actually do for these patients, by far the best thing would be treating with a LASER.

BELLY FAT

WHY IS BELLY FAT PARTICULARLY BAD, WHAT DOES IT MEAN, AND WHY IT IS CRITICAL YOU START DOING SOMETHING ABOUT IT TODAY?

Faced with these risks, it’s no wonder that you want to know how much you should weigh. But this common and important question is actually the wrong question. For health, the issue is not how much you weigh, but how much abdominal fat you have.The Harvard Medical School Family Health Guide

A mirror or photograph is afar better gauge than a scale of whether or not you are at a healthy weight. Doctor Russell Schierling

The picture above is a depiction of the various female body types as seen thru the eyes of Georges Hébert --- an early pioneer in Physical Education. The pictures come from a French book called L'éducation Physique Féminine, which was written almost a century ago. My how things have changed.

It was not that long ago that women hardly ever had "CENTRAL OBESITY" (aka Abdominal Obesity). Yes, we men have always tended to accumulate fat stores around our waists (the proverbial 'spare tire' ---- apple shaped), but women have always tended to put weight on in the hip / butt area (pear shaped). Now it is not only common to see women with Central Obesity, it is shockingly common --- even in women of "normal" weight. These women are often referred to today as "SKINNY FAT" --- the topic of yesterday's post. The point of this post is not to issue an indictment against those of you who are struggling with this particular problem, but to help you understand why Abdominal Fat is so bad, and why it leads to so many other health problems. The cool thing is that if you understand what is actually causing you to put weight on around your waist, you can formulate a plan to conquer it.

ABDOMINAL OBESITY means that you have too much "Viceral Fat". Don't get me wrong; we all require some fat around our Vicera in order to be healthy. But once you understand that the word "Vicera" means organs, and that Viceral Fat is the fat that surrounds (and potentially entombs) your organs, you will begin to understand why Central Obesity is such a serious problem --- a killer.

When a person has large amounts of fat engulfing their organs, that fat tends to create responses in the rest of the body (particularly the ENDOCRINE SYSTEM) that can never really keep up with what is being demanded of it. Although the organs (pancreas, liver, ADRENAL GLANDS, etc) are scrambling to CONTROL BLOOD SUGAR LEVELS, they eventually FALL BEHIND. As organs fail to keep up, weight gain can end up like a snowball rolling downhill --- picking up momentum and feeding itself as it goes. But be warned.... not all weight gain is equal. Some is worse than others.

WHY ABDOMINAL OBESITY IS WORSE THAN GENERALIZED OBESITY

In the early 1980's, researchers began noticing that there was an important distinction between abdominal fat and the subcutaneous fat that all of us have underneath our skin. They realized that the more abdominal fat a person carried, the more likely they were to have DIABETES (decreased sensitivity to insulin), heart disease, strokes, high blood pressure, HIGH CHOLESTEROL, and high triglycerides. They began to realize that Abdominal Obesity was a different kind of animal than General Obesity.

As the American diet has gotten worse ----- based more and more on processed grains, TRANS FATS, chemicals, and sugar ---- rates of Central Obesity have skyrocketed. Yesterday's blog proved that at least 7 of 10 American adults are overweight, with about half of those being OBESE. It gets worse. For the over-50 crowd, 50% of the men and 70% of the women are not only obese, they meet the criteria for Central Obesity. What are those criteria?

In the picture on the left, we see a woman with normal sized hips and waist. If we take the ratio of the waist to the hips (WHR -- Waist Hip Ratio), we should see about a .6 or .7 for women, and about .9 for men. Anything over .85 for women and .9 for men is considered to be Central Obesity.

WAIST CIRCUMFERENCE RISK FACTORS FOR ABDOMINAL OBESITY

MEN WOMEN

LOWER RISKMODERATE RISKHIGHER RISK

LESS THAN 37"37 - 40"OVER 40"

UNDER 31.5"31.5" to 35"OVER 35"

A high WHR is associated with all of the risk factors / health problems I listed off earlier. And If you were reading my blog last week, you could probably guess that a high WHR is heavily associated with INFERTILITY as well as SEXUAL DYSFUNCTION. What is shocking, however, is that recent research is linking things like lower cognitive ability with a high WHR. My best guess is that as time goes on, you will see more and more health problems associated with a high waist to hip ratio. But the real question is what does it all mean?

WHAT DOES CENTRAL OBESITY (A HIGH WHR) REALLY MEAN?

If you are a male with Central Obesity --- the proverbial pot belly --- odds are that you simply need to get back on the wagon and lose some weight. If you are a female with Abdominal Obesity, you need to make some serious changes to your life. For one, it is important to realize that you are probably stressed out. Adrenally stressed out that is.

Cortisol (aka Hydrocortisone) is your body's chief stress hormone, and is made by by your adrenal glands in response to stress. Bear in mind that this stress can come in many forms; emotional, physical, dietary, etc. According to a popular online encyclopedia, the chief functions of Cortisol are to, "increase blood sugar through gluconeogenesis; [and] suppress the immune system...." Did you catch that? Cortisol is an Immune System Suppressor that raises blood sugar via gluconeogenesis (creating sugar from muscle tissue or fat stores). Although creating sugar from fat might sound like a wonderful thing, in many cases it is not.

If a person already has high blood sugar levels and gets a subsequent boost in blood sugar, they are going right back into storage mode unless they burn it for energy. This is unlikely. Since these folks are already fighting Central Obesity, the new sugar they create from metabolizing fat is simply re-stored as fat. Only this time it will be stored as belly fat. If occurring on a regular basis, this process will literally exhaust your body. This is why it is called Adrenal Fatigue and is intimately related to Fibromyalgia (ADRENAL FATIGUE OR FIBROMYALGIA?). Also be aware that HIGH FRUCTOSE CORN SYRUP ---- the sweetener most commonly used for practically all modern processed foods ----- is more associated with Belly Fat than other sugars --- far more associated.

OTHER HEALTH PROBLEMS ASSOCIATED WITH ABDOMINAL OBESITY

Of course there are the health problems I listed earlier in the post. However, it don't stop there. There are a host of physical ailments that are being directly tied to Central Obesity. Some of them include......

ALZHEIMER'S DISEASE: Although a number of studies have linked Abdominal Obesity to Alzheimer's, a study from Dr. George Razzy's team of Launceston General Hospital, University of Tasmania, Australia showed that older people with Central Obesity had a 10 times greater chance of developing ALZHEIMER'S DISEASE than the general population.

LOW / HIGH TESTOSTERONE: If you are a male (or FEMALE) who is struggling to hit home runs in the bedroom (HERE), odds are that you have some degree of Central Obesity. Clear back in 1990, a Dutch study showed that men with Abdominal Obesity were much more likely to have high insulin and blood sugar levels, while having low testosterone. However, if you are a female, listen to what Drs. Rasa Kazlauskaite (Endocrinologist) and Sheila Dugan (Physical Medicine Specialist) of Rush University Medical Center have to say about testosterone. "When that delicate balance of estrogen to testosterone shifts toward testosterone during the menopausal transition, the distribution of fat also shifts and women tend to accumulate more belly fat. In men, we know that when their testosterone decreases naturally as they age, they tend to accumulate belly fat, but in women it isn’t really about having more testosterone, it’s about upsetting the estrogen-testosterone balance. We used to think estrogen protected premenopausal women against cardiovascular disease and that the increased cardiovascular risk after menopause was related only to the loss of estrogen’s protective effect. But now we know that it’s actually the change in hormonal balance that’s largely responsible for visceral fat. So if you’re a woman in your 30s or early 40s and you aren’t already eating healthy and exercising regularly, you should get started now and work hard to maintain these healthy behaviors throughout the menopausal transition."

PCOS: Strongly related to the above, if you have PCOS, you are much more likely not only to be INFERTILE, but to have Central Obesity as well. Women with Central Obesity are more likely to deal with a wide range of hormonal issues (see the first link in the bullet point above).

INFLAMMATION: People with Central Obesity are much more likely to have high systemic levels of INFLAMMATIONin their bodies. Inflammation is strongly associated with nearly every health problem you can mention.

LOW BACK PROBLEMS / ARTHRITIS: Do you think it might be hard on your joints carrying 50, 100, or 150 extra pounds of weight around for years, or even decades? It's a no-brainer (HERE).

GALLBLADDER DISEASE: Who is likely to get GB Disease? People with Central Obesity. The moniker we learned in school was "fat, fertile, female, and forty".

METABOLIC SYNDROME: What is METABOLIC SYNDROME? It is essentially a pre-diabetic condition that is in play if a person has at least three of the following ----- a blood pressure of 130/85 or higher, a triglyceride level above 150, a fasting blood sugar level of 100 or greater, low HDL levels, or high LDL levels. By the way, if you were paying attention to yesterday's post, you realize that large numbers of people of "normal" weight have at least one of these.

FATTY LIVER: Although a Fatty Liver is usually thought of as being a problem of alcoholism, the largest class of people who develop this problem are those with Central Obesity.

CERTAIN KINDS OF CANCER: The truth is that many kinds of CANCER --- particularly the ones that originate in the abdominal areasuch as colon cancer, are heavily associated in the peer-reviewed literature with Central Obesity.

SLEEP APNEA / BREATHING DIFFICULTIES: Show me a person with Central Obesity who breathes just fine, and I will show you 100 that do not (HERE). And if it is bad enough to affect sleep, I promise it will affect your health in other ways.

BLOOD CLOTS: Enough said.

OSTEOPOROSIS: Even though OSTEOPOROSIS is often associated with tiny little women, the truth is, if you have an oversized belly you are at risk (HERE).

Although Obesity is bad, Central Obesity is doubly bad. If you want to live a long, enjoyable, life, and be there for your children and grandchildren, you need to do what it takes to get this problem under control. Fortunately I have created a plan for you. All you have to do is follow the information on THESE POSTS. Granted, it's a ton of information. But there is no way to effectively lose weight, get healthy, and stay that way for life unless you know what made you fat in the first place. Knowledge is power, and if you will follow the advice on my blog, virtually everyone reading this post will know what it takes to get a handle on your Central Obesity. Just remember; the choice is yours.

WHAT IS "SKINNY FAT"?(METABOLICALLY OBESE --- NORMAL WEIGHT)

PH Kenny

I remember the first time I heard the term "Skinny Fat". I was reading a post on the PALEO DIET, which was talking about the epidemic of young women of normal weight, who had spindly arms & legs ---- and big bellies. Believe it or not, there is actually a medical term for this ---- MONW. It stands for Metabolically Obese -- Normal Weight. These people do not carry enough lean body mass (muscle), but also have too much Visceral Fat (deep abdominal fat surrounding their organs). And although these folks might fit into the perfect spot on a height / weight chart, they are not healthy ---- and they are certainly not "skinny". Don't believe me? Let's take a look at a couple of recent studies from the peer-reviewed medical literature.

Not quite a year ago, the August 2012 issue of JAMA (Journal of the American Medical Association) published a study done at Northwestern University's Feinberg School of Medicine in Chicago. The study concluded that almost a quarter of the "normal weight" population would fall in to the MONW category. Think of it another way. According to government statistics, nearly 70% of the adult American population is currently overweight or obese. This latest study brings the total closer to 80%. And here is the real kick in the teeth. These MONW individuals die off at twice the rate of visibly fat people if they have DIABETES. But forget the adults for a minute, lets look at the younger generation.

If you pay attention, you will notice that a lot of today's teens could be classified as MONW. A study published one year ago this week in the medical journal Pediatrics shows us that things are even worse than we thought. Yes, they admitted that teen obesity was a huge problem that is related to a host of serious health problems. But they also admitted that nearly one in four teens of normal weight had at least one of the signs of METABOLIC SYNDROME (pre-diabetes), such as high BP, HIGH CHOLESTEROL, UNCONTROLLED BLOOD SUGAR, etc. In fact, many experts are saying that when the rubber meets the road, only about one in five US children could truly be categorized as healthy.

This is one of the biggest reasons that our government school's OBESITY PREVENTION PROGRAMS are failing so miserably. They fall into the trap of modern medicine; always trying to tie one's health to one's weight (HERE). The so-called "skinny" people feel they are justified in eating whatever they want since they fall into the proper spot on the Height / Weight Chart. The problem is that they are not only undermining their health with these bad habits, sooner or later they will end up visibly undermining their weight. We all know that skinny guy who is constantly scrounging for food ---- loading up on fast foods, junk foods, and deserts. Trust me. He won't be the "skinny guy" forever. If you think your body will perpetually be able to keep up with the steady barrage of SUGAR, JUNK CARBS, and TRANS FATS, and still maintain a normal weight, just show up at your next High School Reunion. You will be in for a rude awakening!

WHAT TO DO IF YOU ARE SKINNY FAT

OK; so you realize that you likely fall into the MONW (Skinny Fat) category. What can you do about it? Actually you can totally reverse it and get healthy in the process. And the cool thing is, you are ahead of the game since you do not have huge amounts of weight to lose. For you it will be more about redistributing the weight you currently carry. Make the proper changes to your diet and lifestyle, and let your weight take care of itself. What are these changes you ask? Although I have immense amounts of detailed information on my website, it can be broken down to three simple steps.

EAT A WHOLE FOOD-BASED DIET:It is imperative that you eat a diet based onWHOLE FOODS and Whole Food Supplements. As you might imagine, this will likewise help you to.........

AVOID PROCESSED FOODS AND SUGAR: Eating low on the Glycemic Index (LOW CARB or PALEO) will help you CONTROL YOUR BLOOD SUGAR. These first two steps will help get rid of the "fat" part of Skinny Fat. This next step will help you gain some lean body mass (muscle) and change your body's shape as well as provide your metabolism a significant boost.

LIFT WEIGHTS / DO SOME SORT OF RESISTANCE TRAINING: Although I am in no ways against things like walking or biking, it is imperative that you add some sort of RESISTANCE TRAINING to your exercise regimen. In case you need some more information on this topic, go HERE.

HEALTH or EXCUSES?THE DOG ATE MY HOMEWORK

Image by David Shankbone

All of us are guilty of using excuses. It's simple human nature (BTW, that was an excuse). Sometimes these excuses are legitimate (I was late to work this morning because my house burned down last nite), sometimes they are not (I can't workout today because I was abducted by aliens from Uranus last evening). The bottom line is that when it comes to your health and your weight, excuses are going to set you back dramatically. They also become a habit. Instead of making excuses, FORMULATE AN EXIT STRATEGY. I will leave you with a few of my favorites as far as things you can do to get healthy, get to a normal weight, feel great, and maintain it for the rest of your life with minimal effort.

What's interesting is how many people contact me (or leave comments on Facebook) saying this like this; "but how am I supposed to fix it?" It's a legitimate question, but one that I have provided an answer for over and over again. Even though it is far from 'comprehensive,' it's a starting point. Take a look at THIS PROTOCOL and see if some of it resonates with you. BTW, there is good reason that my clinic CHECKLIST HANDOUT starts out with an Elimination Diet.

BEATING INFERTILITY NATURALLY

Infertility. It's a significant issue in the US. And if you are one of the millions of couples dealing with this issue, you are already aware of just how emotionally devastating it can be. According to the latest CDC statistics.....

-Number of women ages 15-44 with impaired ability to have children: 6.7 million

-Percent of women ages 15-44 with impaired ability to have children: 10.9%

-Number of married women ages 15-44 that are unable to get pregnant for at least 12 consecutive months: 1.5 million

Wow! Almost seven and a half million American women under 45 years old have been through IVF FERTILITY PROCEDURES known as ART. And if you throw in male infertility (numerous studies say that this accounts for nearly half of all infertility) and ERECTILE DYSFUNCTION, you can can begin to see why so many couples are unable to have children. As a woman, what can you do about it? Well, you could spend a fortune on fertility drugs, hormonal treatments, and procedures that seem more suited for a guinea pig than anything else. Sometimes these work, although there are a bundle of potential side effects. The other option is to beat infertility naturally. Here are some simple (generic) steps toward achieving your Fertility Makeover. Honestly, it's not rocket science. Some of the very same things that work forVARIOUS DISEASE PROCESSES and hormonal issues are used to treat people with Infertility.

CONTROL YOUR WEIGHT: If you are either overweight or underweight, your chances of getting pregnant diminish substantially. Plainly stated, if you are having trouble getting pregnant and are overweight, you'll have to LOSE IT. Period -- end of story. Although there are many reasons that women (or men) gain weight, the biggest has to do with the fact that most infertile women are failing to..........

CONTROL BLOOD SUGAR: This is the number one most important thing on the list --- by far (HERE). In case you have not been following my blog, let me share a secret to improving every single aspect of your health --- CONTROL YOUR BLOOD SUGAR! Uncontrolled Blood Sugar is being intimately tied to virtually every single health problem under the sun, including PCOS. PCOS (POLYCYSTIC OVARY SYNDROME) is critical to understand because it is not only the number one cause of infertility in America (75% OF IT), it has a known cause. One of my all-time favorite movie lines was delivered by Arnold Schwarzenegger in the movie Predator. After the Predator (an invisible alien that is stalking a group of mercenaries through a South American jungle) trips a booby trap, everyone in Schwarzenegger's elite para-military unit lets loose with a wild burst of automatic weapon fire. Arnold looks around and finds some yellow blood on a branch. His response; "It bleeds..... We can kill it." The known cause of PCOS is Uncontrolled Blood Sugar. Fix your blood sugar (including HYPOGLYCEMIA) and you have just solved the major cause of infertility! Even if you have not (yet) been diagnosed with DIABETES. In case you did not understand, let me say it one more time. Deal with your blood sugar regulation issues and you have just dealt with the number one reason women fail to conceive. But in order to do this, you'll have to.......

MAKE THE NECESSARY CHANGES TO YOUR DIET:Let's not beat around the bush. If you really want to have a baby, you need to go Low Carb, or better yet, PALEO. A WHOLE FOOD-based Low carb diet is going to allow you to deal with your blood sugar. And Paleo ---- the next logical step in the process ---- is going to do two biggies for you. It is going to cut NEUROLOGICALLY REACTIVE foods such as GLUTENout of your diet. It is also going to help you control Inflammation. Getting pregnant will requite that you understand INFLAMMATIONand the things that drive it. Let me quote to you from a study that came out just last week from the University of Pennsylvania Perelman School of Medicine as reported in MedPage Today. By the way, this study provides an excellent example of the pitfalls of being "SKINNY FAT".

"Two-thirds of the women who ate protein rich diets achieved pregnancy versus 31.9%, said Jeffrey B. Russell, MD, of the Delaware Institute for Reproductive Medicine. And the results were even more impressive when a high protein intake was combined with carbohydrate restriction as pregnancy rate climbed to 80%. People talk about obesity and BMI, about not getting pregnant when they are overweight, but we had some patients who were healthy, 110 to 115 pounds, and they were making terrible quality embryos. They were thin, young and healthy, but couldn't get pregnant..... The lessons of this study might also be applied to diabetics who have the highest miscarriage rates, highest abnormality rates, and the highest birth defects and stillborn rates..... Fruits, vegetables, and lean meats will produce better quality sperm, as well as better quality eggs."

GET ADJUSTED: Although I rarely have patients who come to me specifically for fertility issues, I cannot even begin tell you how many women over the past 22 years have gotten pregnant after being under chiropractic care. If you want to better understand why, just go HERE.

AVOID XENOHORMONES: Xenohormones are benzene-based chemicals (virtually any chemical with a smell including cleaners, perfumes, gasoline, etc) that mimic the effects of estrogen in your body. Understanding Xenohormones is critical --- especially once you realize that most American women already tend toward Estrogen Dominance. GoHERE to learn more about Xenohormones. Oh; and hopefully you are already aware that SOY is a phyto-estrogen that should be avoided at all costs.

AVOID CHEMICALS & TOXICITY: This can be in the form of alcohol, junk food, caffeine, pesticides, herbicides, etc. If you are trying to get pregnant and still SMOKING, you are probably already aware that you are shooting yourself (not to mention an unborn baby) in the foot. To avoid all of the crazy estrogen-based hormones contained in commercial meats (again, Xenohormones), make sure you are consuming organic. You will also need to watch out for VACCINESas they contain all sorts of toxic chemicals and elements, including mercury and aluminum --- known fertility disruptors. I could say the same things about most DRUGS.

EAT THE RIGHT FATS: Avoid TRANS FATS and make sure you are taking your PGFO. Cook with Coconut oil and use Extra Virgin Olive Oil to make salad dressings.

TAKE THE CORRECT HERBS FROM THE BEST HERB COMPANY ON THE PLANET: Firstly, there are a host of pregnancy-friendly herbs such as Chaste Tree, Dong Qui, Vitex, Stinging Nettle, Red Raspberry, Red Clover, Maca, Alfalfa, Oatstraw, False Unicorn, Saw Palmetto, and others. Secondly, you need to get them from a reputable company such as STANDARD PROCESS / MEDIHERB. You should be able to find many of these combined into a tea as well.

HAVE MORE SEX AT THE RIGHT TIME, USING THE BEST POSITION(S): A few weeks ago my kids and I took the Appleseed Project's rifle shooting course. In order to qualify as a "Rifleman", you had to hit very small targets a certain number of times in a certain amount of time. Needless to say, the more shots you could get off in the shortest period of time, the better your chances of qualifying. This is true of conception as well. Figure out WHEN the best time for conception is, use the Missionary Position with a pillow underneath your rear end to assure that semen gets to the cervix, and by all means, make sure your husband is putting a lot of lead downrange (i.e. have lots of sex during this time). If you are having a problem in this area, HERE are the posts to read.

GIVE IT TIME: We have all heard the saying, you are what you eat. While this is true, it is not completely true. It would more accurately say, you are what you ate last year (or ten years ago, etc). For instance, the half-life of Trans Fats is nearly two months. Do not think that dietary and lifestyle changes made today will result in a pregnancy tomorrow. Give your makeover a year to work. I just talked with a patient who, after spending a fortune unsuccessfully going thru IVF for two years, radically changed her diet. Within a few months she was pregnant. And shortly after having her first, she was pregnant with her second. Take the right steps, give it a bit of time, and good things will happen!

CONCLUSION

In-Vitro Fertilization techniques (IVF) are not only expensive (and not covered by health insurance), they are notoriously difficult to control. You could just as easily end up with multiple births (think "Octomom" here) as ending up failing to get pregnant at all. There are also a growing number of potential side effects. As you will notice from the quote below, it takes on average about three sessions of ART (Assisted Reproductive Technology) for a woman to become pregnant.

According to CDC’s 2011 preliminary ART Fertility Clinic Success Rates Report, 163,038* ART cycles were performed at 451 reporting clinics in the United States during 2011, resulting in 47,849 live births (deliveries of one or more living infants) and 61,610 live born infants. Although the use of ART is still relatively rare as compared to the potential demand, its use has doubled over the past decade. Today, over 1% of all infants born in the United States every year are conceived using ART.

My biggest issue with ART / IVF is that it does not address any of the numerous underlying causes of infertility as listed in the body of this post (there are others as well). By following the Fertility Makeover protocol, you are more likely not simply to end up pregnant, but to ultimately end up with a healthy baby. In this day and age of rampant sickness, disease, and AUTOIMMUNITY, why would you not be interested in something that could not only positively affect your ability to conceive, but positively affect the health of your embryo, as well as the health of your newborn?

COCA COLA TRIES TO MAKE GOOD

StockSnap - Pixabay

If you are a regular reader of my column, you realize thatSODAPOP is bad for you on many different levels. Much of this has to do with the fact that it is arguably the leading reason for the wide variety of health problems associated with UNCONTROLLED BLOOD SUGAR ---- including DIABETES. And in case you were not aware, soda is now the number one source of calories for the 15-25 crowd (HERE) and is being directly linked to America's obesity epidemic --- an epidemic that is starting to show itself worldwide (HERE). In fact, blood sugar regulation issues are the root of almost every single health problem you can name.

It seems that public pressure has finally got to Coca Cola and forced them to at least pay lip service to changing their marketing strategies. And it's not only Coca Cola. It seems PepsiCo and other beverage giants are succumbing to public pressure as well. CEO of Coca Cola, Muhtar Kent went as far to say that, "the key here is to ensure that in every market where we operate to have no- or low-calorie beverages of our main brands available". The push is to diversify into fruit juices (most of which are 90% sugar water), DIET SODA, and sports drinks. But is this really beneficial?

Hopefully, you read my recent piece onDIET SODA. Numerous recent studies have shown that diet soda is actually responsible for more obesity instead of less --- almost twice as much. When are people going to wake up to the fact that calorie count doesn't mean much (HERE)? Processed sugar is bad all around, and even natural sugars should be consumed in moderation. Then there is HFCS. But the truth is that the diet versions of all of these are worse --- much worse. It is important to understand this and educate your children about it from an early age.

SUPERBUGS

NIAID

A popular online encyclopedia defines the term "Superbug" as.....

"......... a form of drug resistance whereby some (or, less commonly, all) sub-populations of a microorganism, usually a bacterial species, are able to survive after exposure to one or more antibiotics; pathogens resistant to multiple antibiotics are considered multidrug resistant (MDR) or, more colloquially, superbugs."

In plain English, overuse of antibiotics creates bacteria that cannot be killed by antibiotics. Scary stuff. If you really want to freak yourself out, simply Google the term "Superbug" and see what comes up. I promise you'll be shocked. Here are excerpts from just a few of the articles that have come out since the first of the year.

"Sally Davies, the U.K.'s chief medical officer (a role equivalent to the U.S. surgeon general), warned Parliament that contagious antibiotic-resistant disease is an imminent crisis and should be included on the government's official register of possible national emergencies, right next to terrorist attacks and natural disasters.... There are few public health issues of potentially greater importance for society than antibiotic resistance". Antibiotic-Resistant Disease Crisis May Bring 'Apocalyptic Scenario,' UK Health Officer Says. January 25, 2013 (Huffington Post)

"The most recent study on health care-associated infections in U.S. hospitals, found that, out of about 1.7 million infections, nearly 99,000 patients died. According to one of the study's authors, the vast majority of the deaths were due to superbugs." -Superbugs: A ticking time bomb, January 27, 2013 (CBS)

"A family of 'nightmare' superbugs — untreatable and often deadly — is spreading through hospitals across the USA, and doctors fear that it may soon be too late to stop them, senior health officials [with the CDC] said Tuesday.... They're resistant to nearly all antibiotics. They have high mortality rates, killing half of people with serious infections. And they can spread their resistance to other bacteria." CDC sounds alarm on deadly, untreatable superbugs, March 6, 2013 (USA TODAY)

"Germs are perfect machines of evolution. Their ability to mutate and survive attempts (by humans and nature) to destroy them has led to some being called 'superbugs'..... According to medical experts, the main cause for the resistance is that antibiotics are increasingly given to patients for common viral ailments such as colds and flu, for which antibiotics are ineffective anyway. Some 190 million doses of antibiotics are given in U.S. hospitals every day and nearly 133 million are prescribed daily by doctors in the U.S. according to the American College of Physicians. Half of the latter are considered unnecessary." Superbugs Are a 'Costly War We Can't Win, Thursday, April 4 2013 (CNBC)

"More than half of samples of ground turkey, pork chops and ground beef collected from supermarkets for testing by the federal government [ the National Antimicrobial Resistance Monitoring System — a joint program of the Food and Drug Administration, the Agriculture Department and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention] contained a bacteria resistant to antibiotics, according to a new report highlighting the findings..... The numbers are pretty striking. It really raises a question about the antibiotics we are using in raising animals for meat." Report on U.S. Meat Sounds Alarm on Resistant Bacteria, April 16, 2013 (New York Times)

"Doctors are warning that a drug-resistant strain of gonorrhea could be more deadly than AIDS, and are urging members of US Congress to spend $54 million for the development of a drug that would fight it...... This might be a lot worse than AIDS in the short run because the bacteria is more aggressive and will affect more people quickly." Worse than AIDS - Sex Superbug Discovered in Japan Called Disaster in Waiting, May 7, 2013 (RT.com)

How do you protect yourself from these so-called Superbugs? It is not as difficult as you might think. Let me explain by sharing a story from my childhood. I grew up less than a mile away from a rural Kansas dump. "The Dump" was the place that everyone hauled their garbage to. It also happened to be a favorite place for a bored kid to periodically visit. Nothing better to do? Just ride your bike out to the dump. You could shoot bottles with your BB gun, smash windshields of old cars, set fires, blow up aerosol cans, and find all sorts of wonderful treasures that people could only have thrown away by accident. Oh; and the dump also had a lot of rats.

Think about this for a minute. It is not difficult for us to grasp the fact that the dump did not somehow cause these rats, but instead attracted the rats to it. You could have done whatever you wanted to do to get rid of these rats. You could have poisoned them. You could have shot them by the truckload. Or you could even sick the dog on them. The bottom line is that whenever you ceased your eradication methods, the rats would return ----- quickly. Why? Because that's the sort of environment they are attracted to. And as long as their environment is intact, you'll have rats. One of the big mistakes of modern medicine is that they are trying to eradicate the rats in the dump ----- without ever cleaning up the environment that attracted the rats in the first place. This is known today as "THE HYGIENE HYPOTHESIS".

Instead of helping sick patients deal with their diseases by attacking underlying causes (cleaning up the body's internal environment via diet and lifestyle), far too may doctors act as though the problem is those dadgum germs. And if germs are the problem, we already know the solution ----- ANTIBIOTICS. But if you know anything about the relationship between bacteria, GUT HEALTH, and the Immune System (HERE), you already know that over the long term, this is not only an exercise in futility --- it is actually going to cause sickness and disease (HERE).

Think about it a different way for a moment. Even in a MAJOR FLU EPIDEMIC, not everyone gets sick. In fact, most of the time, not even the majority of the people get sick. If the germ theory of disease were accurate and true, there would be no one around to teach it to; they'd all be dead! People get sick not simply because they are exposed to germs ---- we are all exposed to germs 24 / 7 / 365. They get sick because a weakened Immune System is easily overwhelmed (HERE).

What does the average American do? They run to the doctor's office for more Antibiotics. These Antibiotics do what they are supposed to do --- kill bacteria. Unfortunately, they kill / destroy the 80% of your Immune System made up of bacteria that is found in your gut (HERE). Because your Immune System is further weakened, you get sick yet again. The doctor prescribes more antibiotics. Repeat ad infinitum. This is why Antibiotics are, right along with crappy diets, arguably the greatest detriment to American health (HERE).

WHY DO I HAVE A CHRONIC COUGH AND STUFFY NOSE?

Michal Jarmoluk - Kielce/Polska - from Pixabay

Are you one of those people who deals with a constant sniffle, cough, or SINUS INFECTION? It's more common than you think and means that you have something driving a perpetual INFLAMMATORY RESPONSE within your body. Although this could be caused by just about anything, your problem is likely to be easily solved with solid dietary changes. It is interesting to note that over the years, I have seen hundreds of patients get rid of chronic coughs, ALLERGIES, sinus problems, sniffles, etc, as a side effect of trying to LOSE WEIGHTby going Low Carb.

DIRTY PACIFIERS, VAGINAL DELIVERIES, & PREVENTING CHILDHOOD ALLERGIES

THE BEAUTY OF BACTERIA

"Vaginal delivery, which is a source for transfer of a complex microbiota from mother to infant and parent and infant sharing of a pacifier might both lead to microbial stimulation, with beneficial effects on allergy development."

For a very long time I have been telling people that many of us are too clean (HERE). What do I mean by this? Do we need to go back to the pre-Semmelweis days of blood, pus, and filth? Certainly not! But it is a medical fact (albeit one that your doctor will not talk to you about) that we must be exposed to lots of bacteria from birth on if we want to be healthy (HERE). Although bacteria get a bad rap and cause most of us to rush for the hand-sanitizer, this is being shown time and time again to be the wrong response. And ANTIBIOTICS are even worse ---- much worse. I have said repeatedly on my blog that Antibiotics are quite possibly the number one destroyer of health in America.

A recent Swedish study led by Dr. Bill Hesselmar (MD / PhD) that was completed at Queen Silvia Children's Hospital in Gothenburg, and published in the journal Pediatrics provided an interesting boost to this thought process. When parents stick a child's pacifier in their own mouths to clean it off (yeah, I never did that myself either), the child ended up with significantly less ASTHMA, ALLERGIES, and eczema (a common AUTOIMMUNE DISEASE). This study actually reminded me of the study that was done on DOGS IN THE HOUSE AND CHILDHOOD ALLERGIES / EAR INFECTIONS. Although all of this sounds rather bizarre, aren't you interested in finding out why it's true?

The authors postulated that the transfer of oral and vaginal bacteria from the parent to the infant was the responsible factor supplying the beneficial results. In fact, the researchers stated that, "Exposure of the infant to parental saliva might accelerate development of a complex oral / pharyngeal microbiota that, similar to a complex gut microbiota, might beneficially affect tolerogenic handling of antigens by the oral / pharyngeal lymphoid tissues. Moreover, oral bacteria are swallowed and hence also affect the composition of the microbiota in the small intestine, which may in turn regulate tolerance development in the gut." I am not sure how many times I can say it, but your GUT is where 80% of your Immune System lives --- mostly in the form of thousands of different species of bacteria (HERE). It is why there is an old axiom in natural medicine that says, "fix the gut, fix the body".

The same study addressed the benefits of Vaginal Deliveries as opposed to C-sections. Until fairly recently in history, the C-section rate in America was not only the highest on the planet --- no one else was even remotely close to us. Unfortunately, several countries, including China, have passed us by. America's overall C-section rate is currently one in three --- up from about one in five 15 years ago (in 1965 it was less than one in twenty) . It is now our nation's number one most commonly performed surgery. Yet when you look at infant mortality rates, there are over forty countries better than us. Something is not adding up (much of this has to do with our insane VACCINATION POLICIES).

This is just one of the reasons that home births or birthing centers are the way to go. Swaddle the newborn and let them nurse --- immediately; without cleaning them off first. Sounds crazy to many of us, but this is the nature of the bacterial transfer. And it's not like this is new information. There has been a growing voice for the tearing down of the "sterile" barriers between mothers and newborns in the hospital setting. In fact, in a recent article, Dr. Amal Assa'ad ---- a professor of Pediatrics and board certified Immunologist / Allergist ---- told clinicians at Cincinnati Children's Hospital Medical Center that.....

"We have to let nature play out a little bit and not be too clean and not be forming artificial barriers in the connection between the mother and the infant."

CHILDHOOD OBESITY IS OFF THE CHARTS

Thayne Tuason

Seven of ten American adults are overweight. Half of these are obese. Is this a health crisis? You better believe it is! Just ask the politicians who are trying to figure out how we going to raise enough revenue (i.e. increase taxes enough) to pay for the crazy amount of healthcare required to take care of a largely overweight population and their vast array of diseases? The government's answer? Utterly stupid ideas like PSA'S, SODA BANS, and more USELESS, EXPENSIVE PROGRAMS. Unfortunately, the problem continues to get worse. One of the biggest differences in yesterday and today? A large percentage of today's oversized adults were normal sized children. Think about your childhood for a moment. Back in the day it was rare to have an overweight classmate. But as you look at forty years worth of statistics, you find that this is becoming the norm.

My son recently attended a grade school "Track Meet" at a Midwest suburban public school. His comment to me was, "I have never seen so many overweight little kids in my entire life!". According to government stats (the CDC), one in four children in the 2-5 age group is overweight, while about one in three school aged children is overweight. These stats are much worse if you are a minority or if you live in the South, nor does it take into account the numerous children that are MONW. It all begs the question of what you should do as a parent to combat childhood obesity and help your child get to and maintain a healthy weight.

REALIZE THAT YOUR CHILD'S WEIGHT IS YOUR RESPONSIBILITY: That's right, your child's weight is up to you. This might mean no more SCHOOL LUNCHES. It might also mean that you will actually have to revive your role as the parent and decide what your child will and won't eat. I routinely get parents in my office make excuses for their children like this. "I realize what you are saying is true, but little Johnny simply hates vegetables". Or, "little Johnny won't eat anything other than chocolate cake and Cheetos" (HERE). Or here is one I heard the other day. "Little Johnny would not eat his lunch so I gave him cookies. He had to eat something didn't he?". Take a deep breath and repeat to yourself. I am the parent and they are the child --- I am the parent and they are the child. You will also have to...............

TAKE RESPONSIBILITY FOR YOUR OWN WEIGHT: Have you ever gone to an overweight doctor? Or a doctor who smokes cigarettes? When SOMEONE IN AUTHORITY tells you to do as they say and not as they do, there is a huge loss of credibility. If you are overweight and trying to get your kids to eat healthy while constantly eating JUNK yourself, you have no credibility with your kids. As a parent, make sure you are leading from the front. Period. Leadership means that you must........

EDUCATE YOURSELF AND YOUR CHILDREN ABOUT HEALTH, DIET, AND EXERCISE: There is all sorts of advice on getting to and maintaining a healthy weight (HERE are some examples). It is up to you to educate yourself and then pass it along to your family (children included). The problem is that there is lots of conflicting advice out there. This is why I have simplified the process for you and given you some great links to follow. They are found in the paragraph below.

The first thing you need to do in order to lose weight and get healthier in the process is CONTROL YOUR BLOOD SUGAR --- even if you have not (yet) been diagnosed with DIABETES. Fail to do this and you are wasting your time. Next, you need to take a look at some of the things I have written on this topic of OBESITY. The great thing is that working with children is easy compared to working with adults. In most cases, they have not had their problem long enough to set up the diseases of obesity.

Do not wait another day to get started on this project. Oh, and one more thing. If you think that feeding your child a steady diet of crap is OK because they are of a normal weight (or even underweight), you are sadly mistaken (HERE). Not only are you setting them up for a future of overweight / obesity, you are likely condemning them to a lifetime of CHRONIC INFLAMMATORY DISEASES as well AUTOIMMUNITY. As you can see, creating HEALTHY CHILDREN is not something that happens automatically without some effort on your part.

DRUG COMPANIES FOCUS ON NEUROLOGICAL DISORDERS AND CANCER

Ewa Urban - Lublin/Polska - from Pixabay

There have been a slew of recent scientific articles talking about antibiotics. Not only has over-prescription and overuse of antibiotics played a big part in ruining our nation's health (HERE), the drug companies are manufacturing more of them than ever (HERE), but are not developing any new ones. This is true of many other classes of drugs as well (i.e. CHOLESTEROL DRUGS). So; what kinds of drugs are the Pharmaceutical Industry focusing on? Easy. They are concentrating on producing the drugs that people will either make them a boatload of quick money --- or drugs that people have to take for a lifetime. No surprise here. They are focusing on drugs for CANCER and Neurological Disorders (things like NEUROPATHY, PARKINSON'S DISEASE, ALZHEIMER'S DISEASE, and many OTHERS.

Hopefully you read the recent post about cancer doctors who are complaining (and rightly so) that 11 of the 12 cancer drugs OK'd by the FDA last year, cost, on average, over $100,000.00 apiece. And as for neurological problems; remember the old saying, "Diamonds are Forever"? The Pharmaceutical Industry realizes that they could change that to "Neurological Diseases are Forever". For them, creating drugs for Neurological Problems makes financial sense. Why create drugs like antibiotics that are prescribed for a week or ten days, when you can create drugs for diseases that are "incurable" --- diseases that people can only hope to "manage"?

And lest we forget; the medical community is doing a poor job of telling people why rates of Neurological Diseases have skyrocketed in recent years. Much of it undoubtedly has to do with the same things that are related to cancer. These would include POOR DIETS, poor lifestyle choices, lack of exercise, stress, etc, etc. But lets go one step further. In case you have not seen it, you may want to check out my recent piece on THE LINK BETWEEN NEUROLOGICAL DISEASES AND GLUTEN.

If cancer and Neurological Disorders are numbers one and two as far as new drugs are concerned, what rounds out the Trifecta? Glad you asked. Drugs for AUTOIMMUNITY,INFLAMMATORY ILLNESS, and the ENDOCRINE SYSTEM. The truth is that until both doctors and patients lose their disconnect between diet and disease, people will continue to get sick in never-before-heard-of numbers, and the drug companies will make out like the bandits they are. Oh, the joys of EVIDENCE-BASED MEDICINE.

Dr. Schierling completed four years of Kansas State University's five-year Nutrition / Exercise Physiology Program before deciding on a career in Chiropractic. He graduated from Logan Chiropractic College in 1991, and has run a busy clinic in Mountain View, Missouri ever since. He and his wife Amy have four children (three daughters and a son).